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Chapter Text

Regulus

There was something deeply wrong with James potter. 

That was the first thing Regulus thought as he watched James step onto the Hogwarts express. The fog rolling off the train's chimney quickly obscured James from his vision, shrouding him in a cloak of milky grey smoke. But it was too late, the image was already imprinted into his retina, playing like a movie against his eyelids when he closed his eyes. 

To be honest Regulus isn't sure what planted that seed in his head, or what detail in James' form initially registered to his eye as wrong. Maybe it was the way his eyes seemed sunk into his skull, or maybe the way that his rucksack seemed to weigh less than the bags around his eyes. Or perhaps was just the aura that swam around the boy. 

The cloud of dark cloying energy that stuck to the boy like a second skin. A sadness that had wound itself deep into James' bones. 

But James Potter was not Regulus' problem, he hadn't been for a very, very long time. And Regulus was just starting to be okay with that. 

*****

James

’You alright, Sirius?’ James said, awkwardly climbing into the already rather full train compartment. 

It was a stupid question to be honest, but one he felt he had to ask anyways. Sirius’ hair was gone. A punishment favoured by his mother. The job was shabby though, leaving Sirius' usually midnight tresses, an odd muted colour where they were shorn too close to his skin. She had obviously used a cutting spell, clear by the straight, unfeeling lines that marked all through his hair. 

Sirius' hair was important to him, which is why his mother tended to love to cut it all off. 

He could barely find purchase for his feet among the swarming mass of legs and bodies, stuffed into the all too small space. But he couldn't find room in his heart to complain. The ambient noise of chatter and laughter filled a void that had steadily grown over the summer. 

He loved his home and more than that he loved his parents. But the Manor was quiet, and all in all too lonely. 

James squeezed himself into the narrow space beside Sirius and the window, enjoying the warm feel of his closest friend beside him. He didn't waste time before the incantation for the hair growth charm was falling out of his lips, his wand making the subtle movements of the spell, and the warm flow of his magic prickled his fingertips. 

Sirius didn't say anything, but he didn't have to. The way he leaned back into James, resting his head against the curve of his shoulder, spoke any thank you or apology that the situation demanded. They had always been like that. Wordlessly understanding, and wordlessly forgiving. 

Once the train started moving though, the separate conversations seemed to merge into one. 

James had often found that the wizarding world, when not connected, could be rather lonely. Owls, though effective, were slow, and letters did not carry the same weight as spoken words. So when faced with reunion for the first time in what was nearly two months, everyone desperately wanted to know how the other had spent their time. Desperately making up for the lost time. 

Peter, had visited his sister Margret, a care of magical creatures teacher at Ilvermony, and had spent his summer tracking a flock of demiguises with a research team at the university there in July. 

Mary had visited her ancestral home, in the south of France, which was her mother's alternative to finishing school. And while Mary no doubt had dodged a bullet, she was sitting suspiciously straighter than when they had left for summer. 

Remus and Lily though, had gone fully off the grid, as having to explain domesticated owls travelling in and out of muggle villages in the middle of the day, was significantly harder than spending the summer no-contact. So the majority of the rest of the train ride was spent with them documenting their travels, to the rest of the group, before the interrogations moved on to other targets. 

And once the brakes of the train screeched against their metal tracks, signalling their arrival into their seasonal home, they were all content that they'd managed to make up for the time spent apart.

They never did get around though, to asking James about his summer. 

Chapter Text

Perhaps James was being ambitious when he said this year would be fine. 

it was not going to be fine. It was his OWLS year, which meant, from the second he literally stepped onto the train platform, he had about sixty different professors, students, friends, and random people telling him how hard his life was going to be for the next year. But then similarly warning him about how easy this year would be compared to next year, when he would start his NEWT courses.

He was good at school, at least he thought he was. Sure potions was a bit of a shit-show, but...  But he could do this right?  

The train platform was loud, which didn't much help matters either. First years, who were scared the boats would leave without them, were screaming at their friends to hurry up, or scrambling to get their luggage off the train in time.

Sirius however, did not share his morose anticipation. He, was quite happily (now that his hair was back), chatting to remus about their party there were planning to have to celebrate the first day back. 

James didn't have the heart to tell him he couldn't quite stomach a night of lousy drunks and too-loud music. He would do it anyways, but perhaps it's not exactly how he planned to be spending his first night back. 

But it would make Sirius happy, that's all that mattered. 

****

It was interesting watching James again. 

It wasn't something he'd done for years, not since his brother had definitively disowned him, or designated him as "one of the family". At that point, his whole friend group had become associated with the air of grief that Regulus held for matters concerning Sirius. And despite his continued fascination with the boy, Regulus just... stopped watching. 

But something about James had caught his eye. He was like the fucking sun, dragging him in with his own gravity, pulling him towards his core, waiting to burn him up, turn him into ash. 

Though he shouldn't say the sun part out loud. Regulus figures being compared to a celestial body might be too much for the Gryffindor's ego to handle. 

And though he tried to pay attention to his own friends, and the going's on of his own table, one corner of his vision was always trained to the corner of Gryffindor table, with the boy with a messy nest of raven hair. 

He had a plate of food in-front of him, and a half-drunk goblet of what looked like pumpkin juice next to that, but James seemed more interested in the colour of shoes he put on that morning, than the plate of food he had dished out for himself. 

Regulus figured he was not hungry, perhaps the fatigue from the train-ride had drained his appetite along with his energy. But Regulus found it hard to convince himself of that. 

He supposed he looked healthy enough, as lean and athletic looking as he remembered him being. But all the same, Regulus found those little markers, the bluish tinge to his skin, the ashen hue around his mouth, the slump of his back where perfect posture should've reigned. 

Regulus added it to a small but every-growing checklist of things he noted wrong with the boy, and continued with his dinner. 

****

Sirius was honestly going to kill him one day. 

Somehow, he had managed to sneak in a bottle of firewhisky in his trunk, probably stolen from his parent's liquor cabinet. And along with Remus' stash of muggle alcohol already hidden within the dorm, it made for quite a few drunk people, within a very short amount of time. 

That is exactly how James Potter found himself in the corner of Gryffindor common room, nursing a double shot of vodka and coke.

James didn't like drinking. It left him feeling too nervous, too anxious of misjudging the line between tipsy and black-out drunk. James didn't like that lack of control over his own faculties, over his own speech. But sometimes, when the screaming in his head became too loud, too unbearable, a shot or three... or five, was usually a good cure. 

Today though, it wasn't happening. He had already had a shot or two of firewhisky, and two others of the same drink he was holding in his hand, but his mind wasn't playing victim to the alcohol in his system. His thoughts refused to quiet, echoing like bullhorns around the caverns of his mind. It was deafening. 

So only after about an hour of being at the party James left. 

****

Regulus often liked to come here, to look at the stars. 

The astronomy tower is always quiet. By design he thinks. Its in the furthest most secluded area of the castle, to the point where students that take it as an optional subject are given extra time in between their classes to even have a hope at getting there on time. 

Furthermore, only really the bottom three classrooms are ever used for classes. The gazing floor, was essentially just a large open plan rooftop, with barely a sliver of the room covered by a stone awning, and a flimsy, half rusted iron fence separating the children from the sheer drop of the tower.  

The floor being completely exposed to the elements, always made the higher up classrooms too cold, too draughty, as well as the gazing floor itself, largely inhospitable to most regular human life. 

So the majority of observation lessons were taken in the observatory, and Regulus was left alone. 

Usually. 

Today was a day of exceptions it seemed. 

Because when Regulus Black made the trek to the uppermost floor of the most secluded tower in all of the United Kingdom, he did not find himself alone. Instead he found himself accosted by the very man he had come there to contemplate. The very face, that had haunted his thoughts, since the moment he stepped foot onto platform 9¾. 

Perhaps he should not have been so surprised. Only people with shitty things to think about could be bothered to make the trek there, to think in peace. 

Regulus though James looked like a man with a lot of shitty things to think about. 

The boy himself was nursing a waning drink in his hands. The ice, un-melting in the unrelenting Scottish cold. Despite the icy wind and biting cold, James was only wearing a thin looking jumper, and some old sweatpants, with at least a pair of warm socks under his shoes. 

Perhaps Regulus should have been concerned about his improper attire, Regulus thought there were more pressing things to be worried about. 

'Potter?' Regulus said.

James swung his head around lazily, searching for the origin of the noise before settling his eyes on Regulus. 

'Reggie?' James whispered, a half-smile forming on his lips. 'The fuck are you doing here?'

'Same as you I suppose.' 

'Oh, that sucks, I'm sorry.' Regulus liked that he didn't need to explain. 

'Wanna sit?'

Regulus didn't reply, simply plopping down next to where he was sitting, right in the middle of the floor, knees pressed against his chest. 

'What are you thinking about?' Regulus said. 

'Dragons' James said, taking another sip of his drink, his head lolling back, exposing his face to the full brunt of the sky. 

'Dragons?' 

'Yup' He said simply. 

'Care to explain?'

'Nope'

Fair enough. 

Chapter Text

Regulus took another look at the boy sitting next to him.

This was the closest he had ever been to James Potter. His whole life up until now he had only watched him from afar.

It made him sad, in a small, unquantifiable way, that the planes of his face had almost become... unrecognisable to him, shifting in ways he could no longer understand. Time had changed them both, he suppposed. Despite it all, James was still, undeniably... James. He had that same light around him, that same, gravitational pull. 

'I've missed you Reggie, how've you been?"

'Dragons to small talk, quite a shift if I do say so myself.' Reggie said, avoiding the question, and pointedly not commenting on the nickname James had always insisted on. 

'King of the segue me.' he sighed, taking another sip of his drink before turning his face towards him again, 'Seriously though, I see you in the hallways sometimes, and I always want to say hi. I don't know why I don't, to be honest.' 

James leaned back against one of the stone seats, meant to act as makeshift desk for an unlucky student with an astronomy class on this floor. He let out another breath, the rest of the tension in his muscles, seeping into the floor. 'Sorry, I didn't think I was this drunk. Sorry if I'm not making any sense.'

'No, no.' Regulus replied, waving his hand in dismissal. 'You mean that though?' He asked after a moment. 

James nodded, 'I'm sorry I stopped talking to you after... well I don't know why I stopped talking to you actually. I guess, Sirius stopped talking to you in school, and out of some weird misguided friendship loyalty thing, so did I, I guess. I'm sorry.' James said after a second. Guilt lacing his voice. 

'It's fine James, you were a kid. So was i. Kids do dumb shit all the time.' He said genuinely. 

But James just frowned and shook his head. 'No. There was no reason for me to just quit talking to you out of the blue like I did, it was shitty. Even me, as young as I was back then should've recognised that.' James turned towards Regulus again, studying his face and his expression, 'And you're okay, Regulus? I was always worried about you.' 

'Why were you worried about me?' Regulus said, confused. 

'Slytherin can be lonely. I always hated the thought of you alone in those dungeons, it wasn't fair to leave you so alone.'

Regulus paused, 'It can be lonely, but that's alright. I don't mind it, not really.'

'No-one likes being lonely, Reggie. Not even snakes. They form communities did you know that? They're very picky apparently, snakes'll only hang out with like minded snakes, otherwise they kick them out. Seems pretty fitting.'

Regulus laughed, 'How'd you know that?'

James smiled that smile that warmed the pit in Regulus' stomach, his eyes crinkling under the force of it, 'I read a book on it.' James saw the shocked expression on Regulus' face and his smile grew somehow larger, 'Oh shut up, I can read. I was gonna wow you with all my snake facts after you got sorted.'

'Why didn't you?' Regulus replied, hating the pathetic tone his voice had taken on. 

'I- I don't know. I guess I was worried you had other people who would tell you snake facts.' James said. He was very clearly drunk, or at least severely tipsy, but Regulus laughed at the genuine sincerity in his voice. 

'I will always want to listen to your snake facts Jamie. Go on, tell me another one.' Regulus laughed.

'Oh fuck off, I know you're messing with me.' James said, the cheek splitting smile returning to his face. 

Regulus laughed again, 'No I am not. I love your snake facts.' 

'I know, only fucking heathens wouldn't love a snake fact.' James huffed, but seemed to be searching his brain for another fact to wow regulus with, 'Okay, there is a species of snake in every continent except Antarctica.'

Regulus looked at him incredulously, 'Seriously.' he drawled. 

'What? fuck off its a good fact!' James joked, 'Oh for christ's sake I read the book like four years ago when I was twelve, I'm trying my best here.'

Regulus brought his thumb up to stroke James' chin in a mock reassuring gesture, 'You're doing great, sweetheart.'

Regulus tried his best to ignore the blush that spread like ink across the apple of James' cheeks, as they both laughed at their own antics, revelling in their, if only temporarily, re-emerged childishness. 

After a few moments though, James propped himself up again onto his elbows, his eyes meeting Regulus', as though searching for something there. 'But you're okay though, right?'

Regulus nodded, his heart feeling lighter than it had in months, if not years. 'Yeah I'm better now. But you're not running off again, okay?' he said, less of a statement, and more of a question. 

James shook his head, 'No, I'm not.' James didn't say anything else, and didn't really look as though there was anything more to offer. It was as simple as that. Perhaps it didn't have to be anymore complicated. He just turned his head back towards the open expanse, and watched as time slipped by again, drink forgotten. 

They didn't talk for a while, simply laying side by side, staring at the unchanging starry sky. Watching, as the earth spun, and galaxies turned, and planets orbited their suns a million million miles away. 

****

It was nearing 4AM when they finally decided to leave the tower, the light from the rest of the castle, fully draining away, leaving them only their wands to shed light on the ground.

But neither of them could find it in them to complain, because somehow, both of them, had left the tower with the weight around their shoulders a little lighter, and for the first time, in a very very long time, the incessant, rabid, feral screaming in James' mind, had stopped, at least for a while. 

And that was a good thing at least. 

****

Chapter Text

'James?' Was the first thing James heard as he woke up the next morning, along with the rather ghastly sight of Sirius Black, the Casanova of griffindor tower, the morning after a night of heavy drinking.

'The fuck do you want Sirius?' James said quickly, his tone much sharper than he had intended it to be. 

'Jesus, someone has it bad. What was it? The fire whisky's, or maybe it was the girl you snuck off to see last night. She's not still here is she?' Sirius said happily, while rather unsuccessfully trying to lay down his hair in the mirror. 

'What the actual fuck are you talking about Sirius?'

'Hey, hey, gees guys calm down, who's banging who?' Peter joked as he sat down on Sirius' bed. He didn't drink so it made sense for him to be the most jovial of the bunch. 

'No one's banging anyone Pete.' James said, his tone softening as he snapped back into his surroundings, 'Sirius is just being a dick.'

'Am not'

James just looked at him. Perhaps it was the tired look under his eyes that had finally begun to show in his mannerisms, or the way his posture, over the course of the conversation had slowly hunched. But for the first time, in what very well could've been forever, Sirius relented. 

'Fine.' Sirius mumbled under his breath, 'I am still going to figure out who you snook out to see last night. Ooooh, I bet it was Marlene, was it Marlene?'

'Marlene is dating Dorcas you know that Sirius' James said, still trying to shake off the tiredness that laced his bones. 

'Yeah you're right. Still didn't deny it though.'

James stayed silent. Sirius thought he was dating someone, that was actually a much better assumption than the actuality. That he spent the entire night sitting in the astronomy tower with his brother. Yeah... probably not the best idea. 

After a minute Pete spoke again.

'Are you alright James?' Peter said sincerely. 

'I'll be fine Pete.'

He just hoped he didn't realise he didn't answer the question. 

****
James went to the Astronomy tower again, as soon as he finished his classes, the headache that had been steadily building over the course of the day, starting to set in.

His mind had just been... busy. Too busy to focus on Sirius' subtle attempts at interrogation over a lunch his mind was too busy to eat, and much too busy to focus on schoolwork, or anything outside of the two by two square that his vision had become. 

His mind was a hurricane, the eye of the storm lost in the gale force winds that were wracking skull as it pounded against his skin. Nowhere was safe, and the storm was unrelenting. 

It didn't help, he supposed that he couldn't talk to his friends about it. It wasn't as if they didn't listen to him when he would tell them about these things, more that James felt like they didn't really understand. When he told them about things, especially Sirius, it slightly felt like he was talking through a thick pane of glass, his words distorting as they left his mouth. 

So he didn't tell them anymore, for fear that he would be misunderstood. 

This meant though, that on days like this, which he might add, were becoming increasingly common, interactions with his friends became unnervingly taxing. 

His hands shook, as he tried to help Lily with her Arithmancy calculations, his head swayed as he stopped an argument between Dorcas and Mary. HIs ears rang as he tried to concentrate on what Sirius was saying. 

It became tiring, less because of the incessant noise in his mind, and more from the effort of keeping it together throughout the day. The force of his own will, stopping him from breaking down and crying halfway through charms, or the strain of keeping a smile on his face when he found it in himself to speak. 

Life became fuzzy, like he was watching himself through a low pixel count TV screen, like the ones they had to play muggle football in the leaky cauldron. His hands seemingly moved of their own accord, his legs walking, without his say-so. 

Most of all his memories blurred together, each day becoming increasingly indistinguishable from the next. Time flowed, almost non-linearly, his mind replaying scenes as he walked, and worked, and talked, from years passed. The images replacing his vision. 

James knew he should tell someone about it. Tell someone he couldn't handle it anymore, tell them that the thoughts in his head didn't feel like his own. But what would they do? What could they do? For someone whose own greatest enemy was his own mind. 

So he laid on the cool floor of the astronomy tower, and let it win. Let the screaming drown itself out among the other noise of his restless brain, while his mind wandered among the stars. 

James wondered what life had been like before all this. Before his DNA seemed to break, turning his own sentience against him. He came up empty. Although he supposed, he was too young, back before this all started, to truly appreciate it, before it had been ripped away. 

In the end, there was no use in wondering.

This was life, James just had to get used to it. 

****

'Where's James?' Peter said, once they were all back in the dorm. Sirius was getting ready for dinner, and Remus was reading his book on his bed.

'I dunno.' Sirius called out from the bathroom, 'Probably snogging that girl he saw yesterday.'

'Ew, Sirius.' Remus said, finally looking up from his book. 'He's probably helping lily or Mary or someone in the library, you know how he is.'

'Why don't you check the map?' Peter said, as he unpacked his bag from the day. 

'Oh shit, good shout Pete.' Sirius rifled through his things, 'Fuck, I think James might have it. No chance of finding out who his mystery gal is now.'

'I really wish you'd drop that pads.' Remus sighed, turning his attention back to his book. 

'Why? Merlin Moons it's harmless fun.'

'Whatever you say Pads. Don't blame me when it blows up in your face.'

They were all tired. The first day back during OWL year was always notoriously bad. Every single teacher, in every single fifth year class, had spent at least a third of the lesson warning the lot of them, how gruelling and positively horrifying this year was going to be. Truly inspirational. 

'Do you think everything is alright with James?' Pete said after a minute. 

Sirius just looked at him before bursting out laughing. 'Pete that's a joke right?', Peter stayed silent. 'Honestly if I didn't know better I'd admit you to the Janus Thickey. That's like asking if a small child enjoys smushing peanut butter on its face. Of course.'

'We'll ask him when he comes for dinner Pete.' Remus said, looking rather fed up with the interruptions to his otherwise rather peaceful reading time. 

****

Regulus found James in the astronomy tower again. 

He was laying, probably sleeping, in the middle of the floor, still wearing his school robes, with his arms crossed over his chest. His bag was set haphazardly next to him, with his shoes not straying too far away. 

Regulus thought he might've looked peaceful laying there, were it not for the tension that pinched his mouth, the circles that ringed his eyes, or the hollowness that had begun to show around his cheeks. 

Regulus took off his cloak and gently covered him with it, eying the tips of James' fingers that were tinged with blue. 

It took about half an hour for James to wake up, his eyes blinking as they strained against the waning Scottish daylight.

'Reggie?' James said, his voice hoarse from sleep.

'Fucking hell.' Regulus breathed, clutched his chest as his eyes looked up from where they were trained on the book he had gotten out to pass the time. 'Merlin, you sleep like the dead, Jamie, I half thought you wouldn't wake up.' He said, breathing hard as he worked past the adrenaline that had shot into his blood from the startle. 

'Oh one can dream eh?.' James said sleepily, resting his head back against the cold floor as he rubbed his eyes. 

'What?' 

'A joke, reggie m'dear. Perhaps its too early for those.'

'It's five o'clock in the evening Jamie-sweetheart. Speaking of, why are you up here so early? Tough day.'

'You could put it like that, yeah.' James didn't have the heart to tell him that it wasn't a tough day not really, just a never-ending one. 'Why're you here?'

'Mulciber and Avery were being dicks. So I guess I needed somewhere they would never even think of finding me.'

'Yeah those bastards probably don't even know the difference between a sun and a star never mind their names. Wait, I thought you were friends with them?'

'How'd you know that?'

'I used to watch you. Oh wait Merlin that sounds so creepy, not like that. I just liked to check up on you, make sure you were doing okay. I always saw you talking with them. What happened?'

Regulus laughed, 'I was friends with them, really good friends... Yeah, I don't know what happened, actually. I think I got too rebellious for them. I have a brother in Gryffindor after all.'

'The scandal' James gasped

'Indeed' Regulus laughed, his heart feeling lighter. 

They sat for a minute in silence appreciating the hues of the setting sun, before Regulus got up, and dusted his robes off from where he was sitting on the floor. 

'I'm getting cold, so I'm gonna head off. Want to come down to dinner with me?'

'No that's okay, I'll stay up for a while. I'll come down and grab something later.'

'That's a lie we both know it Jamie. Come on, or I'm dragging you.'

'Merlin, Reggie how'd you know me so well. Infuriating.' He said, straining as he stretched out his legs. 

'You're not the only one who was watching.' Regulus laughed. 

Chapter Text

Dinner was an interesting affair. 

He knew he was not welcome with Reggie and the Slytherins. The rivalry between Gryffindor and Slytherin had drawn to a peak as they neared the first house cup match of the year. So as much as he would have loved to escape being badgered by Sirius for the rest of dinner about where he had been all evening, it was probably a better alternative to being gutted like a fish at the Slytherin table. 

Reggie seemed to understand his concern. Simply nodding his head towards the bountiful food laid on each table, gesturing for him to go eat. But before Regulus could head back to the Slytherin table, a warm hand wrapped round his wrist, pulling him gently. 

'Hm?' Regulus said, his voice barely a whisper compared to the roar of the great hall. 

'I've still got your jacket, love. Aren't you going to be cold?' James said, a layer of worry lacing his eyes as he motioned to remove the cloak that had been laying across his shoulders. 

'No, you keep it,' Regulus said, draping the coat snugly again over him. 'I'll get it off you tonight maybe?' His words were more a question than a statement. But the nod from James' head assured him he was not too bold in his assumptions. 

James did not know why his heart sunk as he watched Regulus walk back to his own table, only that it did, and that it felt worse than any quidditch accident had ever done. He also did not know why exactly he was dreading going back to his own table, he loved his friends. More than perhaps what was healthy. But, if he was being honest, he could not stand the inevitable backlash he knew he was going to get from Sirius. He loved the guy, with all he had to give, but honestly, if he couldn't leave his friends for one minute without being tried in the High judicial court of Sirius Black, then...

Well he didn't know  what then, what that meant for his friendship or what the resentment that was slowly building up over Sirius' insatiable questioning meant either. He only knew he was sick of it. But he would subject himself to it anyways. 

'You alright guys? How was Transfiguration Moony? You get up to stasis charms yet? Merlin Minnie's gonna kill me with that bullshit I swear.' James said, plopping himself down in his usual place, as if he had never had the thought of running far far away from the Gryffindor table and never coming back. 

'yeah it was good prongs, we've just started them, I don't really get the involvement of the runes? Are they there for stabilisation or-'

Remus did not get to finish his question before Sirius interrupted. 

'The fuck are you wearing?' 

The table collectively groaned, preparing themselves for another gruelling interrogation session. 

'What do you mean Sirius-dearie?' James said, putting on a horribly false jovial tone. 

'I mean the Slytherin fucking cloak you're wearing. Unless you've turned into a snake I don't think our uniforms are supposed to have green trims?'

James didn't have anything to say to that, instead choosing to push his uneaten food around his plate with his fork. But perhaps staying silent wasn't the best for Sirius' suspicion. 

'Are you kidding me? You're fucking a Slytherin? A fucking Slytherin? Out of all the fucking broads in the school you had to pick a Slytherin? You disgust me, honestly do you know that? Genuinely I feel sick looking at you right now. '

'Merlin Pads, I'm actually done, you know that, I just... no actually I have nothing to say. You can't give it a rest for a minute Sirius can you? You just have to keep pushing and pushing. There's nothing going on Sirius, nothing, not that you've let me speak long enough to actually tell you that.'

James picked his bag up from underneath the bench, and head out of the great hall. 

'James-' Peter stared, but James had already left. 

****

When James went to the astronomy tower that night, Regulus was there waiting for him. 

'Hey.' Regulus said softly, his gaze gentle as he looked over the Gryffindor.

'Hey.' James said, his voice hoarse.

'Everything okay Jamie?' Regulus said, watching James lay down on the astronomy tower floor, before wrapping himself in his cloak, protecting himself from the vicious night air.

'I'd rather not talk about it if that's okay, I know I probably should, but I just, I'm so done with talking. Will you talk for a while? I like hearing you talk.'

Regulus couldn't help the smile that ran over his face. He always feared when talking to his friends, that he spoke too much, that he was too much, too loud, too overwhelming. It was nice to be told the opposite to what your mind tells you sometimes. 

'What do you want me to to talk about?'

'The stars maybe? Sirius would always tell me how much you loved the stars.' Regulus almost noted how James' voice choked slightly as he said Sirius' name, but the night was too clear, the company too perfect to take real stock of such things. 

'Sure. Where should I start?' Regulus paused for a minute, searching the sky for a patch of celestial fabric he could pick apart, before his eyes landed on Cassiopeia, an odd looking constellation but always one of his favourites. 

'You see those ones there?' Regulus pointed to the vague region of stars which constituted it.

'My love you're just pointing at the sky, there are millions of stars I can't quite possibly tell which one you're pointing at. Which ones am I looking for?'

'They kind of look like a lopsided W' Regulus said, taking James' wrist in his hands and guiding it to the space in question.

'Goodness your hands are cold.' James mumbled, before pulling out a pair of handmade gloves from the pocket of his cloak, it was then that he realised he still had Reggie's coat on. He sat up and begun pulling it off. 'No wonder you're cold, you don't have a cloak on.'

James, before Regulus had time to protest, gently lay the cloak over Regulus' shoulders, and pressed the black gloves into his palms. 

'So where were we?' James said, laying back down onto the cold floor. 

Regulus sat stunned for a second, before pulling the gloves on, taking James' hand once again in his own, and unraveling the mysteries of the stars.

****

It was nearing midnight when Regulus had run out of constellations to show James, not something that he had ever really had to deal with before. His unwitting victims usually running away, or dozing off around the 2nd or 3rd explanation of why the constellation Lyra was so damn interesting. But James was a completely different matter. He sat there all the while, listening intently to every addendum and critique that regulus made about the old scholars, every long winded explanation of the mythology behind a very specific set of constellations that entangled to form a beautiful story. 

Somehow, over the course of the night they had drifted closer together. With James' head almost ending up on Regulus' chest with how close they were laying. With every slow rise of James' chest, Regulus could feel James' breath warming the air between them. The only respite from the cold that Regulus had found. 

Regulus could tell that James was on the edge of sleep, he had been for about half an hour or so, but evidently too courteous to interrupt regulus to tell him he needed to sleep. And as peaceful as it would have been to sleep next to James under the stars, he was not risking either of them catching pneumonia, so he knew he needed to wake the boy that was very quickly falling fast asleep.

'Jamie.' Regulus whispered, gently shaking the boy in an attempt to wake him. 

'ngh' James mumbled, curling closer to Regulus evidently to get warmer. 

'Come on love, you need to get up, you can't sleep out here.'

'Are you sure?' James said sleepily, smacking his lips as he continued to shuffle closer to Regulus. 

'100%, come on I'll help you.' Regulus said, picking up both their bags and swinging them over his shoulder before reaching out his hand to help James up.

'I hate you.' James said, before gripping his hand, and pulling himself up with his own body weight.

'No you don't' 

'No I don't' James replied fondly. 'I don't think anyone could to be honest.' James admitted, as they began to descend the flights of stairs towards the main castle. 

'You'd be surprised.' Regulus said, looking down at his shoes.

'Who hates you?' James said, his voice taking on a protective tone despite his evident fatigue.

'Muliber... Avery.' 

'What did you do to them? Actually.'

'I'm gay. They don't like that.' Regulus said, his breath becoming tense as he awaited the reaction from the other boy.

'Oh.' James said simply, seemingly lost in thought.

'Is that a bad thing... for you?' Regulus said, fearing the answer. James, although not a subscriber to any blood supremacist beliefs, was still a pureblood, coming from a long line of wizards and witches. Pureblood's, no matter how benign tended to have some backwards views. For all Regulus knew James could be the same. 

'Goodness no, Reg. Absolutely not, sorry for even making you consider that I would think that. Besides, it'd be pretty hypocritical of me to be honest.' James said, with a small laugh.

Regulus nearly stopped in his tracks. 'You're...'

'Queer, I don't really like labels I guess. But I'm not straight, that's for sure.'

'Oh.' Regulus whispered.

James just smiled. 

'We're here by the way' James said with a yawn. 

Regulus looked up from where he'd been daydreaming and found himself at the Slytherin common room entrance. 

'How'd you know where our common room is?'

'I have my ways.'

'Oh damnit i was going to walk you to Gryffindor! You've stolen my chance to be chivalrous.' Regulus said, petulatntly as a smile creeped up his mouth. 

'You'll have to make it up to me another day.' 

'Will you make it back okay? You're not too tired?'

'Nah Reggie, I'm fine, no need to worry about little ole me.' James said, a note of dark humour that Regulus didn't quite understand slipping into his tone. 

Regulus was silly enough to believe him. 

Chapter Text

James was running on air. 

Perhaps he had been for a while, but now the consequences of too many all nighters studying, catching up from the missed study time he'd rather spent talking with reggie. 

Most nights when James walked Regulus back to his common room, and Regulus thought he was going back to his own, he actually went back to the library and passed most of the night there. At least until 2-3 AM, at which point he'd trudge back to his dorms, lest Sirius become suspicious again. 

James wondered why Hogwarts kept the library open pretty much 24/7, if it were not to encourage pupils to pass their sleeping time trawling through the schools dusty magical tomes. 

His aims to dissuade Sirius' suspicions though were futile. He still spent most his nights talking with Regulus, and his long absences away from the dorms had definitely been noted by the group. 

It was now about 2 weeks into the school term, and James had yet to spend more than one evening in a row away from Regulus and the astronomy tower. They talked about nothing and everything, they talked about their day at school, exams, potions ingredients, and magical rituals. They talked about their home lives and they talked about their thoughts, for hours on end. 

James had never learnt more about a person in such a short time than he had with Reggie. 

James knew about the time he and Sirius went cherry picking in the late summer when Sirius was ten and Reggie was nine, he knows how much of a punishment they both got when they came back from the fields with mud down their Sunday best and cherry stains all over their fronts. 

He knows about how much Reggie's parents started pressuring him to get the dark mark after Sirius left, how much his parents needed him to take up the family mantle after losing their heir. And he knows how much Reggie has suffered by refusing.

He had managed to avoid speaking much about himself though. James knew he had shit going on. He knew he wasn't particularly well in the head, that much he had knew for a while. Not that he would ever tell anyone. 

Even his parents didn't really know the half of it. They only knew what the healers had told them, and even then, it wasn't much. They had tried, for a long time to get him to talk to them. To 'open up' as they had put it. But James had vehemently refused. 

James was worried he would break them to be honest. His parents had always hated seeing their son in pain, so to hear him talk about how much he hated himself, how deeply and profoundly he wished not to exist most of the time. yeah, James thought that might not go over well. But also, he was worried he might just be overreacting honestly. 

His parents had given him everything in life, he had never had to worry about money, or whether or not his parents loved him, which was more than Remus, Peter, Regulus and Sirius could say. He had absolutely nothing to be sad about. And yet he found himself deeply and profoundly sad. That in of itself came with its own special type of self-loathing, one that he and his brain had investigated quite thoroughly as he laid in bed most nights. 

It had been getting better recently, as he was talking to Reggie. The Slytherin seemed to calm his thoughts, like no-one else he had ever known. But then he would look in a mirror, or catch a glimpse of himself through the window of an empty classroom, and bile would rise in his throat. Disgusting. 

But regardless, he knew he could never talk to his friends about these things, never mind Reggie. Imagine how pathetic they would find him, how utterly and completely disgusting they would find him. Maybe they would finally see him like he saw himself. What a horrible day that would be. 

So for now he was content just listening, and re-directing the conversation like a damn ninja when Regulus asked him to talk about himself. 

****

When James got back to the dorms for the night, everyone was already asleep. He felt kind of bad for not spending more time in the dorms. He hadn't properly talked to Remus, Pete or Sirius in a long time. It had been hard to catch them in between classes and studying in the library, and helping first years with their homework after classes, and talking to reggie. 

He didn't really go to the great hall for meals anymore either. Usually spending that time in the library instead, catching up on homework or doing some potions practice down in the dungeons, usually just catching the end of breakfast in the mornings before he went to class, or sneaking an apple or a banana from the kitchens after school. 

He felt bad for being so MIA recently, but he had been so swamped recently with everything he hadn't even had time to breathe, never mind to go off on their adventures like he usually did. 

it was around 2AM when he finally got into bed. The overwhelming exhaustion finally taking over his body, he was asleep in minutes.

****

It was hard getting up in the mornings. James knew he was running out of time before he collapsed, before he burnt out and merlin-knows what would happen next. He had been running on empty for too long. 

Too few meals in too many weeks meant that his body was literally eating itself alive. James had no real desire to starve himself, but it ended up that way a lot of the time. He felt guilty taking that time for himself when he should be spending that time studying fro his OWLs. He had his academic reputation to keep up, and that was becoming harder and harder with his increasingly busy schedule. So if making time for his studies meant skipping meals then so fucking be it. Who needed to eat anyways right?

He'd promised Regulus that he'd meet him in the library to help him with his history of magic essay. It was fucking hard to pay attention in that class, what with Binns having the exact same amount of charisma as a bent teaspoon, so James didn't blame him for needing help. 

But James could slightly resent the fact that he was making him get up so early on a Saturday morning. Regardless, he'd promised him after Regulus came to him one night stressed out his mind because he was worried he might fail. It would have been evil for him to go back on it. 

So he pulled himself together, pulled on some clean trousers, and head off for the library. 

It took him longer than perhaps it should've. His very muscles crying out after just a few minutes of walking, but James kept going. 

When he finally reached the library, he found Reggie in the very back, in the ancient languages section. It was always his favourite place, what with it being so quiet that you could literally hear the pages decay on their shelves. No one except James and a Ravenclaw boy James never remembered the name of even took it in his year, and he heard from his professor that the year below didn't have many more students. 

So safe to say this area of the library was rather abandoned. Regulus, who didn't really like crowds himself, found it heavenly. 

It also was far away enough from Madam Pince that one could talk in a relatively unhushed voice and get away with it. 

'Hey Jamie.' Regulus said, without looking up from the textbook he was reading. 

James' heart skipped a beat at the nickname. he didn't quite know why, Regulus used it frequently enough that James should have gotten used to it by now, but it never failed to make his stomach swoop every time Regulus used it. 

'Hey love.' James replied, sitting down next to him. 'You ready?'

'As ready as I'll ever be. I fucking hate this subject? Tell me why did I choose it again?'

'Because you want to immerse yourself in wizards culture and learn more about the history of the combined magical peoples?'

'Sounds like bullshit to me.' Regulus sighed, banging his head against the desk. 

'You'll be fine, come on, let's start with the goblin wars.'

****

That's how James spent most of his Saturday morning, going through step by step each stage of the magical history course until regulus was confident. They were about halfway when Regulus needed to take a break. 

'My brain is actually going to melt if I do anymore, I'm just going to go to the loo and then get some air quickly, you want to come with?' Regulus said, getting up quickly and stretching his legs. 

'Nah I'm alright, I'll wait here for you, I need to finish an essay anyways.' 

'Okay, see you in like twenty minutes kay?' Regulus said, putting his cloak on and making to exit their corner of the library.

'Sure, take as long as you need.'

James had lied, he didn't have an essay to finish, instead he decided to look around for a book to read. His ancient languages teacher was always telling them to read more to immerse themselves in the tongue they were learning. 

but as he got out of his seat, he felt the world spin, he felt his stomach swoop to the bottom of his feet, but not like when regulus called him nicknames, or when regulus grabbed his wrist, no this felt bad, this felt like he was going to die. 

Finally, he felt the blood drain from his top half, as if all of it was going to his feet. He heard himself say something, before he fell to the floor, and the world went black. 

Chapter Text

Remus had not spoken to James, in honest to god weeks. Okay maybe not weeks, but a week. And even before that, he would only manage to speak a word to the boy before he would run off to god knows where. 

That's how Remus found himself on a Saturday morning in the back of the library in the ancient runes section. A dusty old corner of the library that no-one really visited for being one of the least taken subjects in Hogwarts. James had stupidly left behind the map when he had left the dorms that morning, so Remus decided to use it to at least check up on the boy. 

This, what James was doing now, was completely and utterly out of character. Never in the what five years Remus had known him, had Remus seen James be this reclusive, this isolated from his friends. Sure, he went through his phases of studying non-stop before exams, but never this early in the year, never for this long. 

But when Remus had found the boy, he had the sudden thought that he should have ran here. 

Because when he walked into the dusty corner of the library he found James potter collapsed on the ugly library carpet, his glasses strewn beside him where they must have fallen off on his way down. 

Perhaps it was bad, but Remus had not really looked at James all that much. I mean yeah they had been friends for years, but James tended to be so loud, so large in his presence that you never really looked at him all that much, for fear of having your eyes scoured out with how brightly he shined. But now... his light seemed dull, as if something had quashed his flames, put out the raging inferno of a person that usually was James potter. 

Remus looked at him now. And was horrified by what he saw. 

The boy looked drained. His eyes were almost sunk into his skull, the bags under his eyes sagging under the weight of an overtired mind. James had always been fit, years of quidditch turning his body into a lean mass of muscle. But James just seemed... emaciated. Remus wondered how long they had missed this that it had gotten that bad. 

Remus thought back to the past few weeks, how James had almost never shown up to the great hall for any meals, and how Pete had suggested they go look for him. 

Pads said it wasn't worth it, quite unhelpfully suggesting might he add, that he'd probably gone to use the extra time with his secret girlfriend. Remus and Peter disagreed... silently. 

Remus silently packed up his bag, neatly putting away his parchment into his folders, packing his quill into its case, before putting James' leather backpack onto his shoulders. 

It was only when he went to pick up the sleeping boy that someone came in. The sound of their footsteps startling Remus as he looked into the seemingly deserted library corridor. 

'Jamie?' A small voice called from behind him. It was Regulus, his bags dropping to the floor as he went to the Gryffindor's side. 'What the fuck have you done love?', regulus whispered, gently stroking James' tangled curls. 

'How long has he been like this?' Regulus said, finally turning to Remus, who had been woefully neglected within the entire conversation. 

'I- I don't know?' Remus said, suddenly blindsided by the questioning, 'maybe ten, fifteen minutes?'

'Shit, shit, shit, I was only gone for a second. What the fuck have you done love? How much did he eat this morning at breakfast? Maybe his blood sugar's dropped?'

'He... didn't'

'he didn't what?' Regulus said, a little more frantic. 

'he didn't come to breakfast.' Regulus said, feeling bashful at Regulus' interrogation

'What about yesterday at dinner?'

'Same thing.'

'And the night before?'

Remus looked at his shoes. 

'When was the last time he showed up for a meal? huh?' Regulus pressed.

Remus paused for a few seconds before replying, 'two weeks ago.'

'Oh my fucking god, how the fuck did I miss this.' Regulus mumbled under his breath.

 Regulus picked his bags back up, and hooked his arms under the collapsed boys' shoulders and legs, letting James' head loll against his chest. 

Regulus had of course suspected something was up with James, but to be honest, he hadn't; thought it was this bad. James had come to the astronomy tower to talk with Regulus pretty much every night except for a couple times, and every time he looked fine. 

Regulus found himself playing back every interaction he'd had with James in the past week. Looking for signs that he'd missed something big, that he could have seen the signs and prevented all of this. He thought about that first day, when he saw James on the train platform, ready to fall over from a strong breeze. 

he’d been like this from the beginning, Regulus had just been too blind to notice it.

But Regulus should have seen it when James didn't show up for meals, he should have realised that he was looking weaker. Why didn't he fucking see?

Regulus could only think that it was his fault that he was here, walking down a flight of stairs with James' dead weight hanging in his arms. That it was entirely his negligence that James was now on his way to the hospital wing on what? His third week at Hogwarts?

He could hear Remus trailing beside him as they made the long trek from the library to the hospital wing, his fatigued breaths as the stairs probably wrecked havoc on the Gryffindor's joints.

'your knees okay? D'you need to take a break?'

'How'd you know about my knees?' Remus said, sounding genuinely surprised. 

'Eh, you can tell a lot from watching someone.'

'What do you mean?'

'You grip your right knee every time you get out of a chair, every time you walk too much or too far your joints crack like snapped crackers, especially when its cold, your height probably only exacerbates it. Am I right?'

Remus looked genuinely stunned. 'Damn you're observant.' 

Regulus looked down at the boy laying in his arms. 'yeah, evidently not enough.'

'Hey, its not you're fault-'

'Don't tell me lies, Remus, you don't know anything about it.'

Now it was Remus' turn to look at James. 'No... No, maybe I don't'

Regulus could feel a thin tear running down his cheek as he looked down at the boy in his arms. He felt his heart breaking thinking of how bad it had gotten that James had ended up like this. The extent to which he must have been suffering silently. It killed him. 

Regulus quickly realised that carrying James down to the hospital wing was not going to be a conspicuous affair. It was a Saturday morning right after breakfast, and it was not a hogsmede weekend, so the corridors and stairs were bustling with the student populous. 

Furthermore, seeing an unconscious person being carried down the stairs was probably the most interesting thing that had happened in Hogwarts since the term started, so they attracted quite a few stares. 

Regulus just thought it was a miracle that no-one actually stopped to question them. 

That was until he heard a very familiar voice coming towards him. 

'Get your fucking hands off him. What have you done to him.' Of course it was Sirius. Who else would it be? The little fucker attracted drama towards him like a fucking magnet, so no wonder he was here. He came up to Regulus with Peter trailing not far behind. 

'Would you like to continue along this rather redundant line of thought brother, or would you like to move, so I can get your unconscious friend to the hospital wing.'

'What have you done to him.'

'Rien connard, j'ai le touvé évanoui, après il a raté chaque repas le dernier deux semaines. Mais non! Bien sur chaque chose est toujours ma faute.'

'conneries.' Sirius said, slipping into his mother tongue

'Demander la vérité à ton copain, il va te dire le meme chose.' Regulus said, pushing past Sirius 

'Is this true Remus?'

'I would tell you, but I don't speak French, so I honestly couldn't tell you.'

'Did James collapse, or did Reggie do something? Cause I swear if that little fucker did something-' Remus cut him off.

'No, no, he's telling the truth, I came in and he was on the floor. He's really not well Sirius.'

'He's probably just tired or something, you know Regulus, he's probably just being dramatic about the whole thing.'

'I don't-' Remus couldn't finish his thought, because Sirius had already started to run off to catch regulus. 

he was starting to get tried of this bullshit. 

****

Chapter Text

Sirius refused to leave Regulus' side the whole way down to the hospital wing. Insisting that Regulus would do something evil if he even left his sight for a second. Remus and Peter followed closely behind. 

Regulus' arms had been slowly getting more tired. James, despite being utterly emaciated was still a 6" quidditch player, with some considerable mass. But Regulus was managing it, the intense quidditch training he'd been subjected to his entire time on the team clearly making him stronger than he'd thought. Despite that, he could feel himself tiring. They needed to get James to he hospital wing before his arms gave out, because that was what would have to happen before Regulus would even think of letting the boy go. This was his fault, he didn't see this despite speaking to him everyday for the entire term. If having his arms a little sore tomorrow was the price of his repentance for his sins then so be it. 

They were nearly there though, just one more corridor and then they'd be there. Just their fucking luck that the library was on the complete opposite side of the castle to the hospital wing. 

Sirius however, was not making the trip easy. 

Remus bless his heart try to calm Sirius down, mumbling placating words to the Gryffindor every few seconds, but Sirius would not hear them. 

'Fucking Slytherin, probably dosed him with something. Why did you even know where to find him? Huh?' Sirius said, accusingly. 

'Because he was helping me with my history of magic essay.'

'Bullshit, James would never even talk to a Slytherin like you, never mind helping you with your damn homework.'

Regulus snorted

'What's so funny? Huh? You don't even know James well enough to make a convincing enough lie.'

Regulus laughed again, 'I don't know James? Sounds like you don't fucking know a thing Sirius.'

'The fuck is that supposed to mean?'

Regulus didn't have a chance to respond because they had finally fucking reached the hospital wing. 

Regulus almost ran to Mrs Pomfrey when he saw her. 

'Regulus?' Poppy said, her eyes quickly lacing with concern. 

Once she caught sight of James laying unconscious in his arms, she quickly dropped her clipboard. 

'Quick boy set him down here' she said frantically, pointing to a bed in the corner of the wing. 

Regulus quickly walked over and set the boy down on the white sheets. 

'How long has he been like this?'

'Maybe twenty minutes? It took us five six minutes to get down here. But I didn't see him collapse, he was helping me study, I just went to go get some air for ten minutes and when I came back he was on the floor, is he going to be okay?' 

Poppy didn't respond, simply running her hands over the boy, murmuring incantations under her breath as she did so. 

'He's hypoglycaemic, goodness how did this happen? Huh? any of you?' poppy said, looking over to James' closest friends who were huddled in a group a few beds back. 

Remus spoke first, 'he'd been skipping meals, we'd all thought he'd been eating from the kitchens. But... obviously not.'

'Obviously not.' Poppy deadpanned. 

She disappeared for a moment into her office, coming back with five or six vials of various potions, muttering under her breath all the way. 

'Foolish boy... I need to have a talk with albus... hypoglycaemic students at Hogwarts, I've seen gryffin attacks I've seen potions accidents never in all my years of nursing for this school have I seen a hypoglycaemic student at Hogwarts!' Poppy huffed. Her voice growing more and more erratic as she continued. 

She poured two of the vials straight down James' throat. 

'What did you give him?' It was Sirius who spoke this time, his voice quiter than it had been a second ago. 

'A glucose solution and a sleeping draught. It looks like he hasn't slept a good night's sleep in weeks. Probably exhausted the poor sod.' Poppy said, regulus could have sworn he saw her eyes glistening for a second, but then she blinked and it was gone. 

'Come help me get him changed into a gown, I need to take some blood.' she said, matter of factly. 

Regulus rushed forward to help her. Poppy banished his school shirt and jumper, handing regulus the white hospital gown to pull over his head. 

Regulus was about to do just that, until he caught sight of James’ torso and arms. They were of course rippled with lean muscle as a result of his own intense quidditch regiment, which secretly sent a few butterflies flittering down into Regulus’ stomach.

but that wasn’t what made them both stop. No, instead it was the myriad of scars lining the boy’s upper body. Some were thin and white, faded with age. Some were obviously newer, deeper too, rather than the gentle silver lines, they were thick angry ropes of pink scar tissue, raised against the Gryffindor’s skin.

They mostly  stopped around his mid forearm, but there were two very prominent scars, making lines across his wrists.

Reggie felt his heart stop. Not james. You can take anyone but not James. Regulus pleaded with some unknown entity.

Reggie dropped to his knees as he studied the marks he knew James himself had made.

There was a difference he had found, between inflicted scars and self-inflicted ones. 

inflicted ones tended to be Jagged, random, and haphazard. But self inflicted scars had a tendency to be ordered, done in neat rows and collumns rather than senseless chaos. 

The other thing was the sheer magnitude of the scars on the boy’s body, they spanned everywhere, from his arms to his shoulders to his belly to his hips. There was no place that James had not attacked. 

this was not a new thing either, there were layers to the violence, the older, faded, shallower scars at the bottom, criscrossed by newer marks, pinkish in hue, the skin still slightly irritated and inflamed around their edges.

According to James’ skin, he had been suffering for years. And none of his friends had known.

’what have you done to yourself poor boy?’ Poppy said, pulling the gown onto James herself, before banishing his trousers as well.

there they found more of the same. Except there they found fresh wounds that looked only days old, the skin still puckered. Some looked infected, James was clearly not in the right mind to care for his wounds properly, so infection had evidently set in quite quickly.

Behind him someone gasped.

it was Sirius.

‘What the fuck.’

’Sirius-‘ Remus started, coming in front of the boy to block his view, placing his arms around him and letting Sirius’ head fall against his chest.

Regulus could hear tears start to wrack his brother’s breathing. He could hear Remus’ placating words echoing through the almost silent wing.

Poppy stood still for a good minute before she shook herself, almost reminding herself of why she was there.

she took a long needle out of a packet and began preparing James’ arm. It took her a long while to find James’ vein, what with him probably being dehydrated on top of it all, but when she did she made quick work of it, drawing 3 vials of blood from James’ arm.

‘I’m going to give him a sedative that should kick in when he wakes up. He’d probably be in quite a lot of discomfort otherwise, the symptoms can be quite severe when a patient progresses to this stage. But the sedative should stave most of the nasty ones off. I will warn you though, when he wakes up he’ll be quite out of it, i wouldn’t expect any coherent answers to any questions you might have at least until its worn off.’

poppy procured another vial from her coat, it looked orange with a strange iridescent hue running through it.

’This is an antibiotic he’ll need to take as soon as he wakes up, from the look of those’ poppy seemed to choke on her own words for a second before recovering, ‘wounds on his leg, i’m worried about sepsis, so it’s important that he takes this okay?’

poppy set it down on the bedside table.

’If he wakes up and i’m not here just call me over or otherwise just give him the whole thing, with a glass of water.’

Poppy looked deeply sad for a moment as she looked back over at the boy on the bed.

’I don’t mind if you boys want to stay here, just try not to be too noisy okay?’

Regulus nodded from where he was still sat on the floor.

’Can i grab an antiseptic and some gauze, just to wrap… those?’ Regulus said, vaguely pointing at his leg.

’Of course.’ 

Suddenly they were alone with their thoughts.

****
Poppy came back a few minutes later, a white cream in a small jar, and a bag of white gauze in her hands. She placed them in Regulus’ hands before walking off.

’You’re not touching him.’ Sirius said. Breaking the absolute silence of the group.

’trop tard pour ca.’ Regulus replied simply.

Regulus began to apply the cream gently to  the puckered scabs on his leg. His hands shaking as he did so. Regulus felt sick.

How the ever loving fuck had he missed this? More than that, how had they missed this.

’How did you not notice this Sirius? Most of these aren’t new, some of these look years old.’ Regulus said, unwrapping the bundles of gauze before gently wrapping each one.

’i- i don’t know.’

’You don’t know? Merlin Sirius.’

’Hey, don’t talk to me like that about James. You know fucking nothing about him. Sure i have no fucking idea about whatever this shit is’ sirius said, frantically gesturing towards James, ‘but you know fucking nothing. I still don’t understand why you’re here. Has james even ever talked to you when i’m not there? Or are you just some crazy person stalking my friends?’

‘Christ’ Regulus said burying his head in his hands, ‘i forgot how much of a dickhead you could be.’

Sirius did not reply, and regulus knew he had won.

Chapter Text

James woke to find himself in a room, bathed in blinding white light. James himself could not find the source of it, it seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once. The room itself seemed dimensionless, an eternal empty abyss of white. 

James had often been comforted by the abyss of the night. To look out, and to know with complete certainty, that the world still exists. That he wasn't alone, that this emptiness wasn't permanent. 

This was a different kind of void. James could see, it wasn't as if this light was a shroud, covering his eyes and the world with it, no, the world was just gone, and the void spanned eternity. It was lonely, James thought, to be dead. 

He could not think of how else he would have ended up here. An endless void. 

Empty, except for the haunting faces of those he had let down most in life. 

James turned to the angel that stood next to him. 

'It was cruel of you to bring them here.' He said to the angel. James turned towards him and had the sudden thought that he was the most beautiful being in existence. The angel himself was not bathed in the cold harsh light of the void. He seemed to bring with him his own kind of light, warm and golden and comfortable. His brain was suddenly filled with yellow memories of nights spent talking in the cold. James thought he felt familiar, like a hug on a winter's day. But James shook his head, they could not have met before, angels did not visit earth, at least not for long. 

he felt his lungs start to hyperventilate at the thought of never seeing the angel again. Any other mortal beauty was ruined for him just by seeing the angel's face. Anything else seemed... bland in comparison. 

He felt someone speak behind him. 'Poppy! He's woken up, but he's barely breathing.'

A new set of footsteps came up next to him. 

He felt a quick short scratch on his arm, and then suddenly his white void was replaced with a very fluffy cloud. 

James almost felt like he was melting. He looked down at his hands and could see that the lines that distinguished him and not-him had started to blur, quickly losing definition. 

It was a strangely nice feeling, James felt calm, like he did when he'd had a few drinks at one of Sirius' parties. His mind was quiet, strangely at peace with the situation at hand. 

He looked back at the angel, who was now cradling his face in his hands. James reached towards him, suddenly unsure if he was even allowed to touch a creature as majestic, as divine as he. 

James pulled the angel's hands into his own. Studying the long slender fingers, running his fingers over the small nicks and scars. James looked up at his face. It was tear-stricken. Long red scars trailing down his radiant face, marking where burning tears had fallen, his eyes glistening with unshed tears. James felt shame well up in his cheeks. He had made an angel cry. That was worth a trip to hell wasn't it? Making a being as wonderful as he, sad for even a moment, seemed worth an eternity of torture. 

James reached out to wipe the tears off the angel's face, his instincts to please him overriding his self-control. 

'I didn't know angels knew how to cry. That feels wrong somehow.' The angel let out a sort of choked laugh, his eyes re-welling with tears just as his cheeks welled with red. 

'Goodness Poppy what did you give him? He's high of his mind.' One of the best friends spoke, he looked similar to the angel, but not... Like a very distant cousin. 

'Just another dose of sedative. Should give him enough time to pass through most of the symptoms before it wears off.'

James turned back to the angel, reaching his hand back to cradle his face. 

'Pretty.' James whispered. Not entirely sure whether he had said that out loud or not. 

James looked back around to all the people that had joined him on his cloud. His mother, his father, his best friends, even his headmaster was there. 

he looked at his mother, suddenly very aware, that she too was crying. His heart broke even more than when he saw the angel crying. Now this was a sin worth a hundred tortures. 

'I'm sorry for dying mum, I'm sorry for not being better.' James said, the end of his sentence trailing off, getting quieter as he went. 

The angel grabbed his face this time, 'You're not dead James, I made good fucking sure of that.', James would have listened more to what the angel said, but he was rather distracted by the lovely hands that were gripping his chin. 

'I'm not?' James had a second where he almost felt sad about that. He couldn't stand to keep going on like he was. He was so bloody exhausted. But he supposed he should be happy that he was in fact alive. James tried really hard to be happy. Goodness he tried hard. 

The mother choked, covered her mouth with her hand and then sheltered her face with the father's shoulders. 'Merlin Flea, he looks fucking sad about it. My fucking son is sad about being alive.' She half-whispered, James could almost hear the tears falling from her eyes. 

'Did I do something wrong?' He said, turning back to the angel. He felt his heart drop. Good, another shitty thing he'd done to add to the bloody list. 

'No, Jamie, never.'

The nickname felt familiar, sent butterflies swooping into his chest, he didn't quite know who used to call him that, but they felt special, precious somehow. 

'Wait then how're you here? I didn't realise angels could visit earth.' James said absent-mindedly, turning his attention back to studying his hands. There was a long white scar that ran from the corner of his thumb, and carried on past where his jumper his his wrists. James wondered how far up it went, and what horrible things had happened to the poor being for it to be there.

'Christ.' Said the cousin-like friend. 'I'm gonna slap him when he wakes up.'

Another one of the friends spoke next, the tall one, 'Please don't... He's been through enough already.'

'Shut up.' The angel said, his voice turning harsh, but as soon as his eyes met James' again, they turned gentle. James liked it that way. He couldn't imagine the pain of having the angels eyes turn mean on him. 'How're you feeling Jamie?'

'Good.' James said, fingering the cloud beneath him. 'This cloud is very comfy.'

The tall friend burst out laughing, 'Jesus Christ on a hill he's gone.'

Soon the whole cloud was laughing, James wasn't quite in on the joke. 

'Yes, I think you'll find Mr potter that our cloud services have gotten in better in recent years. I'm glad you noticed.' The headmaster said, a twinkle of amusement lighting up his uncomfortably blue eyes. 

James suddenly felt very tired. The weight of his body seeming to drag him down into the cloud. 

'I'm gonna go inside the cloud for a little bit.' He said, to no-one at all. Then he turned to the angel for what he feared might be the last time. 'You're gonna be back in heaven when I wake up aren't you?' James said, tears stinging where they fought to leave his eyes. 

'No, no. I'll be right here. I'm not going anywhere Jamie.'

James fell into his cloud with a sickly sweet smile on his face.

****

Chapter Text

Effie was crying. 

It had been about a minute since James fell back asleep and James' mum had not stopped crying since. It was raw, and desperate, like only a mother could manage. 

Regulus couldn't blame her. James could almost be mistaken as dead like this. His skin was pale, cold and sunken, his body, completely unmoving. Were it not for the gentle rise and fall of his hand where it still lay on James' chest, Regulus would have thought him a corpse. 

Regulus wanted to say something. Wanted to apologise, for what he did not know. He wanted to say something, break the tension that had fallen like a thick blanket over the room, but... he had no words. 

He had nothing to say that wouldn't be trite, and completely useless to the people he would be trying to help. 

Plus, he was very aware of how awkward it was that he was there. He hadn't spoken to Sirius since they left for King's Cross in September, but even before then the only words they had exchanged over the summer was good morning, and goodnight. 

He had never spoken to any of Sirius' friends really, other than the brief conversation they had shared in his first year, before his sorting had torn him and his brother apart. 

He had also never spoken to James' parents, never even met them, and yet here he was, in the hospital wing, hand resting on their son's chest, staying silent while they weeped. 

He felt like a voyeur, an intruder on a tableau he had not been scripted into. It was an odd feeling, being so clearly and definitely, out of place. 

Yet he couldn't quite bring himself to leave. The last thing James had asked was for Regulus to stay with him. Regulus may have felt he did not belong there, but James evidently did not think so, even as drugged up as he was. Maybe that was all that matters. 

He tried to tell himself that as he felt the burning hot gaze of his brother and his friends, burning into his back. 

'Why are you still here?' It was Sirius that spoke first. 

Regulus still had no words. 

'Yes, my son, perhaps it is time you gave his family a little privacy.' It was Dumbledore who spoke this time. Regulus had never liked the guy, his blue eyes always darting around like a trapped cat, it made him uncomfortable. 

Dumbledore was about to shoo Regulus off his seat next to James' bedside when James' mum interrupted. 

'Oh don't be silly you two, did you not hear James? He wants him here, now I don't know why that is, or even actually who you are, but James made it quite clear that you weren't to be leaving, so I think that's that no?' Effie said quietly, but firmly, wiping the last of her tears from her cheeks with the sleeve of her jumper. 

Dumbledore didn't take his hands from the back of Regulus' chair. 

'I hate to be rude, but Effie's right, i... who are you?' Fleamont said, looking nervously at his wife. 

'I-' Regulus began.

'He's my brother. Regulus.' Sirius finished for him, distaste taking hold of his features. 

Fleamont looked at Regulus as if for confirmation.

'It's nice to meet you.' Regulus said softly, holding his hand out for Fleamont to shake. 

'I'm so sorry Regulus, Sirius never told us he had a brother. I hope you don't think us rude.' 

Regulus turned his head slightly to look at Sirius, to where he was very strategically not looking anywhere near Regulus' direction. 

'No, no, not at all. It's nice to finally meet you, James has told me so much about you both.' Regulus said fondly. It was the truth, when James could be convinced to speak about himself, he usually spoke about his parents, telling Regulus funny stories about them from his childhood. It was very clear James loved them both immensely, he could tell why.

'Fucking liar.' Sirius mumbled from his seat behind Sirius. Regulus tried not to impale him with the chair leg, he really should have been applauded for his self-restraint. 

'Sirius! Language! Goodness gracious me.' Exclaimed Effie, looking genuinely taken aback. 

'Yes Sirius, language, it's rude to speak to family in such a way.' Regulus grinned. 

'Yeah no, I'm not gonna fucking apologise for saying the truth, because honestly, I have some very strong doubts that you've ever even talked to James in your life. I know James, he'd never even think of hanging out with people like you.' Sirius said definitely. 

'And what does that mean, Sirius? People like me?'

'Slytherins, homophobes, baby blood supremacists, to name a few.'

Regulus burst into laughter, to the shock of most of the people in the room. It was funny how little Sirius knew about his life, or even his bloody best friend's life.

'What've you got to laugh about? Huh?' Sirius said, seemingly angry about not being in on the joke. 

'Just how fucking oblivious you are. Also, Sirius, I haven't spoken to you, in years. What in the ever-loving fuck makes you think that you of all people is qualified to tell me what kind of person I am. You know nothing about me. Nothing. And clearly you know nothing about James.'

'He's my best friend, I know everything about him.' Sirius said confidently, as he settled back into his seat next to Remus. 

'Really?' Regulus said incredulously, 'Okay, bet, where's he been going every night?' Regulus said. 

'He has a girlfriend, he's been going to see her.' Sirius said, looking slightly more unsure. 

'Really? You're sure about that?' Regulus said, his voice raising in pitch. 

'I mean we've never actually caught them, but I mean it's pretty obvious.' 

'Ah, so he's told you about her then?' 

'Well no-'

'So you don't know. You don't know a bloody thing. You're just making up wild conjecture, because you're too afraid to admit that your "best friend" has a life outside of you.'

Sirius spluttered, 'like you know where he's been going, none of us bloody do, its a mystery.'

'I do know, do you want to know why?' Regulus whispered. 

Sirius scoffed, 'I-'

'Because he's been visiting me Sirius, every night for weeks, but he's been too bloody afraid to tell you, because of how you've been acting.'

'How I've been acting?' 

'Yes, how you've been bloody acting. You've interrogated him, questioned him, bloody put him up for jail time, every time he dares to spend time with someone that isn't you! You've been acting like such a dickhead for weeks, and no ones said anything, because you're too stuck up your own bloody arse to listen even if they did.'

'I don't believe it. James would tell be If he'd been talking to you.' Sirius said, his voice growing quiet. 

'I know you don't, I never expected you to. But... would he? Honestly, tell me, have you even talked to James since the first day?' Regulus said, turning back to face the bed. 

'I...' Sirius began.

'I think that's your answer right there isn't it.' Regulus finished, he looked over at James to check he was still breathing, to measure the space in between each even breath. 

He looked back over at James' parents, to where they were standing at the foot of his bed, watching the drama unfold. 

'It was very nice meeting you both, I'm so sorry it had to be under such unfortunate circumstances. As I said, James really does say great things.'

Effie smiled, 'Thank you Regulus, and I'm sure we'll be meeting much more often from now on, so don't you worry.' She paused for a moment, looking around the room, 'Why doesn't everyone grab a seat? I think we're in for the long haul here.' she half joked in an attempt to diffuse the tension.

it worked, as the group, which now composed of James' parents, Dumbledore, and the entirety of James' friend group, softly laughed in response. 

There was a brief moment of shuffling, before the group descended into quiet talking. Regulus looked down at the only person he felt truly comfortable talking to there, and knew that it was going to be a bloody long day. 

Chapter Text

James could feel himself wake up.

It was an odd sensation. Being so acutely conscious of everything around you, hyperaware of the sheets under your hands, the voices whispering near his ears, the light streaming into the room he was stranded in, and yet similarly aware of his unconsciousness. 

He knew he wasn't awake. He could feel where the edges of his mind were still fuzzy from sleep, his brain half living, half dead. He was floating in a space, filled with neither sleeping nor waking thoughts, just the blissful emptiness of what seemed an eternal purgatory. 

It was peaceful, and James didn't particularly care to leave. 

He knew what leaving would entail, though exactly how he knew he didn't really know. Perhaps it was some intuition, or some straggling remnant gene of foresight, but he knew that once he cracked open his eyes, he would not find this peace again for a long-long time. 

But life his filled with contradictory knowings. Because he also knew that he had to wake up, that there were other people on the other side of this purgatorial veil who were waiting for him, anxious for him to return. He had been here too long. 

Peace like this was not meant for people like him. Never had been, never will be. 

So he surrendered himself to the gentle tugging of his consciousness, allowing himself to be pulled along the ever-quickening stream of his waking brain until he found himself at the river's end. 

It was just as painful as James had anticipated it being. 

The lights were like needles in his eyes, stabbing and prodding into his retinas like they had wronged the sun somehow. He could vaguely feel people moving around him, the hyperawareness of his delirious mind clearly gone. 

'James! James!' Someone yelled all too close to his ears, the sound echoing like a drum in James' head. He pushed his hands against the bed, in a rather weak attempt at positioning himself upright. it was of course inevitably futile though, his arms felt like paper straws, and his body a chunk of lead, so he collapsed straight back onto the mattress. 

The voice was still sounding, though less close to his ears by now. Through the fuzzy blanket that had settled over his hearing, he could vaguely make it out as Sirius.

He was half glad at that realisation. Glad because it was his best friend, he couldn't quite remember what had happened that he had ended up in what was probably the hospital wing, at least according to the white oppressive tiling on the walls, but he was happy that his friend was there to see him through it, whatever it was. 

But also not glad, because Sirius was here, and James was almost 100% sure that he'd never hear the end of it. 

His vision had just begun to adjust to the light in the room when someone new came, and hooked their arm under both of his, hoisting him up into what vaguely resembled a sitting position. Suddenly all the blood rushed straight down to his feet, his head swam, and his vision swayed again, the fuzziness in his head returning tenfold. 

He suddenly felt cold, like someone had taken off his skin and plunged him into snow. He closed his eyes against the force of these sensations. He felt that same person return him to his previous position, and rest his legs up against a pillow. 

'Yeah maybe let's not do that again hey?' He croaked, his voice coming out hoarse and scratchy. 

Someone next to him laughed a wet sort of laugh, the laugh of someone who wanted to laugh but tears seemed to be getting in the way. James was almost sure that he was the cause of that, and no matter how hard he tried not to dwell on it, that made some corner of him ache. 

'You alright son?' A voice said, though it felt disembodied, as if it was coming from everywhere and nowhere all at the same time. He cracked his eyes open for the second time to see who it was. 

It was his father. 

His father was a very well-kept man. For merlin's sake he invented a whole fucking company just to ensure that he could keep himself looking top-of-the-line with ease. But right then, right there, standing in front of his son's hospital bed, Fleamont Potter, looked positively haggard. 

It was as though the years had multiplied, the lines under his father's eyes had reproduced and were currently fawning over their newest grandson. His face looked sallow, as though he hadn't been eating or sleeping well. James only had one thought. 

He had done that.

Not that he knew how particularly, he still couldn't quite remember how he got here, or why, but there was no better explanation for it. He was sitting in the hospital wing for christ's sake. His dad got nervous over paper cuts, whatever had happened had likely driven him to insanity. 

James would never forgive himself for that. Never forgive himself for doing that to his parents. He was sure of it. 

'I've been worse.' James joked, trying to lift his father's mood, his voice still scratchy against his throat, like sandpaper against flesh. 

It wasn't the right thing to say though, James never had the right thing to say, because his father looked paler at that, his eyes sinking further, his face turning sallower. 

He hated himself. 

'How did I end up here? Sorry if that's blunt, just the last thing I remember was studying with Reggie and then I woke up here.' James said, in the smallest voice he could muster. 

Everyone seemed to freeze, eyes wide, each looking at another, as if waiting for them to take the burden of speaking off of them. 

Finally Ms Pomfrey spoke, 'You had a hypoglycaemic episode lovey, you passed out and hit your head on the way down, which is why you were unconscious for so long. That and the sedative, but that's besides the point.'

'Sorry, blame my limited education on the subject, but I have literally zero clue what that means.' Perhaps that was another wrong thing to say, because Ms Pomfrey took a second to steady herself before answering, as if the question had somehow unsettled her. 

'It basically means your body ran out of glucose, which is what it needs to make energy. You used more energy than you had to hand, and so your body gave out. We usually see it in diabetic students, but on the rare occasion, other people too.'

'And I'm assuming that he's one of the other people?' His mum said, sounding hopeful.

Ms pomfrey gave her a short nod in response, turning back round to where she was fussing with vials and other complicated looking apparatus on a workbench, near to his bed. 

'And is that normal? That something like that can happen, without being diabetic? Is something else wrong that we need to get looked at? We'll take him to get looked at, I mean, if something's wrong I-' His dad interrupted her by putting a hand on the small of her back, moving in small reassuring circles.

She took a deep breath before starting again, 'Is he going to be okay?' His mum said, finally turning to look him in the eyes for the first time since he woke up. 

Ms Pomfrey stopped what she was doing, 'Mrs Potter, your son is going to be fine, he'll need to stay for a couple of hours for observation, but other than that, he just needs to rest, and get some good meals in him. That's it.'

'That's it?' 

'That's it.' Ms Pomfrey repeated. 

It was a moment before anyone spoke again. 

'Mr and Mrs Potter, if you were wanting to, I think now would be the perfect time to go and have that chat you were talking about earlier, don't you? We can leave the children here to catch up, I'm sure they have much to talk about.' Dumbledore said, breaking the silence, his eyes twinkling with that sam uncomfortably consistent mirth. 

His parents just nodded, and followed him out of the room, and up to his office, sparing James one last glance, before they left the hospital wing. 

And so he was left, with what felt like fifty thousand eyes staring at him in silence. 

Well shit.

****

James felt like his mouth had been filled with sand, his tongue sat uncomfortably rough against the roof of his mouth, and he almost knew that if he tried to speak, clouds of dust would emerge instead of sound. 

He didn't actually know why everyone was acting so wierd. It wasn't like this was their first round trip to the hospital wing, they did it every month with Remus, almost every start of the new term with Sirius, and even James himself hadn't been immune to a quick visit in his time. Though mostly for quidditch bumps and bruises, or a bad case of the flu. 

But today, today seemed different, again for what reason James did not know, but he could feel the tension in the air as it hung heavy around them. Thick enough to cut.

It wasn't actually tension, per se, more wariness, a caution that filtered through the air that hadn't been there before. James thought he understood now, what the tiger in the zoo feels like, as people edge around its cage, waiting for it to pounce.

No-one was talking, they were all just staring at him, waiting for him to talk. He didn't feel much like talking. 

'Boo!' James whispered, when the staring finally got too much. When the force of the eyes boring into him from all directions finally started to give him a headache.

They actually jumped.

James started to laugh. Because it was funny wasn't it? He'd woken up in a hospital bed, surrounded by his friends and family who all looked and acted as though they've seen a fucking ghost, and he had no real fucking clue how the fuck he got here. And to top off the lot, his head hurt like his skull was hosting a fucking rave, so yeah, this whole situation was really, genuinely quite funny.

His friends just nervously chuckled along with him, looking to each other with that look that James never could stand to be on the receiving end of. The on that says, 'Has he gone off the rails?'

To be fair the answer was probably yes, but that didn't really matter did it. Not to James at least. So what if he was a bit crazy? He'd been a bit crazy this whole fucking time. If they just hadn't cared to notice, then that was really their problem wasn't it. 

it reached a boiling point though, when Lily came up to his bed, and tried to put a hand on his shoulder, perhaps to steady him, perhaps to calm him, perhaps to restrain him, who knows. 

James didn't care either way. He just hated the look in her eyes, all he could see was pity. He didn't like pity, not the kind that made you feel small. Lily was looking at him like a broken thing. Like a painting in a museum, worn and weathered by time. It used to be beautiful once, but it's half-ruined now.

'We're worried about you James.' she said, her field green eyes boring a hole into each of his pupils, as if she was searching for something in the voids there. 

James frowned, still smiling though. It reminded him of Peter, the way she said that. Like she wasn't asking how his day was, but asking if his brain was on the verge of teetering off the edge of some cliff, asking just how far he'd have to walk before he was jumping off a roof, how close to that edge was he really?

It made him feel evaluated. Like she was trying to calculate the risk rather than understand his mind. He shouldn't have felt as upset by it as he did, really she was trying to help, trying to sympathise, understand, In her own way at least. But regardless, he found that he couldn't quite stand it. 

'What do you mean by that Lils?' James said, sick of the way his brain was turning in circles, trying to find the hidden subtext of her words.

Lily seemed at a loss, she turned round to face the group as if searching for help. She found none. 

'Jesus Christ James!' she practically wailed, 'What could I possibly be worried about? Oh maybe just that one of my oldest friends is in the bloody hospital, because he hasn't eaten for weeks. Jesus James, you nearly died. If remus and Regulus hadn't found you when they did you very well may have! Does that not seem like something we should be worried about? Huh?'

'What do you mean I haven't eaten for weeks? I have eaten.'

'We haven't seen you in the great hall since the second week of term. Unless you've somehow defied Gamp's law and are somehow summoning food into existence at your whim, I think it's pretty safe to say you're not eating. I just don't understand why this has happened. You've never been like this, what's happened? What's changed?'

'What's changed?' James laughed, 'Jesus Christ I can't believe this. What do you mean what's bloody changed. Nothing's changed. I've been eating as much as I always have, I just haven't been going to the great hall to sit with you guys, and keep you company, one because every time I did, Sirius managed to turn it into my own personal fucking hell. Two, because it's my OWL year, and my workload has practically tripled since July.'

'James stop lying, you've never skipped meals, at least not like this, not for this long.' Lily replied, her voice growing condescending in tone. 

'Lily, I haven't eaten three meals a day for years, not since before first year pretty much. Most days, I don't eat two, if that. You were fine with it, you were all fine with it, I don't get it.'

'That can't be true, James!'

'Why not?'

'Because-' Lily sniffled as tears started to roll down her face, 'Because, that would mean you were fucking starving this whole time, this whole times James and I never fucking noticed it. Five years James, how did we not notice it?'

'Lily-' James started, but as he spoke, he realised he had nothing to say. He was completely and utterly lost for words.

Because the thing is, she was right in a way. 

James, up until that point, had just thought that they were just fine with his admittedly odd eating schedule. They never commented on it, when they saw him pushing his food around his plate, pretending to be on his way to a mouthful. They never commented on it, when he never dished a plate up at all, when the only thing he filled his mouth with was laughter and conversation. 

It made him a little uncomfortable in his stomach to think that they hadn't noticed. It made him uncomfortable because he had always noticed their little things. The way Peter would cut up half of one serving at dinner. The way he only poured himself water, rather than pumpkin juice, which was his favourite. 

The way Sirius would always hide a few slices of bread up his sleeve at every mealtime, in the week or so before they went home for the holidays. The way Remus became sick to his stomach at the sight of meat before and after the full moon. 

He had always prided himself on noticing those things. As simple, and as probably irrelevant as they were, they were important facts to James. Because to him, to be known fully is to be loved, and to be understood in all your complexities, is to be whole.

And just then, he felt completely and utterly empty. 

And it was so silly, he knew that, he knew that he was being pathetic, and dramatic, and really the whole situation was his fault, because he'd never talked to his friends about that kind of shit because why would he? And so really how can they be expected to know him, if he refused to let himself be known...

But despite his rationalisation of the situation, the ache remained. Sat like a lead void in the centre of his chest. He felt like the tile behind him, as inconspicuous as a cloud floating through a cloudy sky. 

'Lily what do you want me to say?' James said, for want of better words. 

Lily just cradled his face in her hands. The void seemed to grow, picking up his lungs, his ribs, the beginning edges of his heart. 

It was then that he suddenly became aware of something, something that made his heart beat and his lungs grow tight and his throat draw thin. 

The gentle breeze, blowing against the skin of his arms. 

His arms were out, in fact he wasn't really wearing sleeves at all, just the pathetic little caps of tissue-y fabric that covered the edges of his shoulders. 

If he was being honest, it made him feel kind of sick. It made his vision swim again, that strange sensation of being dunked in a bucket of ice once again a reality. because he hadn't worn short sleeves, even in 30 degree heat in summer, in front of his friends for a very very long time.

Even in the dorm, he had managed, for years, to stay covered up. Making excuses to get changed in the bathroom, or coming out of his four-poster in the morning, his school shirt already donned. 

He looked up, just in time to see Sirius staring at him, his eyes filled with that same pity that had seemingly infected each one of them, like a virus. 

James felt bile rise in his throat, and suddenly he was throwing up over the side of his bed. Overcome with the sheer sensations of what felt like a betrayal. By who? He didn't know. Maybe by his own body. Betrayed by its vulnerability, its inability and unwillingness to keep his secrets. 

Someone was yelling again.

'Ms Pomfrey! Ms Pomfrey!' A voice shouted beside him. It sounded like butterflies. 

Suddenly a bin lined with plastic bags was placed under his face. The clear plastic catching the nothingness that he was throwing up. there was nothing in his stomach, so it seemed like his stomach acid itself was being poured back into his throat. 

A hand was rubbing smooth circles into his back, pressing in-between where his ribs and the void collided. It didn't feel like Lily's hand. it felt strong, and slender, like a pianist's. He could feel where the octaves that James was sure were familiar to the hand pressed like hurricane anchors into opposite ribs. Centralising the storm of his brain onto those two poles, a tornado concentrated on each one. 

James was almost sure that if the hand ever lifted from where it was grounding him, he might die. The cyclone that its fingers had been steadily keeping at bay was constantly threatening to spill over the keys. 

His head was tipped back, eyes still closed, and a cool smooth liquid, like ice cold honey was poured down his throat, dimming the fire that had erupted there as magma seeped from his chest, tearing into his flesh and turning it into ash. 

He opened his eyes for the second time that day, to find a room's full of eyes on him, staring at him, waiting for him to do something, say something. 

James could feel where each of the raised scars on his body were, where each of them rubbed against the air differently, where they pressed against his clothes, or just made themselves generally known to him. He had never hated them before then. Sure maybe he had disliked them, resented them, regretted them, but never hated. 

But he hated them then. He actually, genuinely hated them. Because he realised, as he watched his oldest friends try their hardest to keep their eyes higher than his collarbone, that they would never look at him the same way again. Their perception of him had been forever shifted. 

He felt lost. Only the grounding hands of the unknown pianist behind him kept him grounded, tethered to reality. 

'What do you want me to say?' He said again, his voice suddenly raw and painful. He heard it though, how his voice cracked, how the edges of it gave way to the beginning of tears. 

When no-one said anything, he sat up fully in his bed, straightening his spine from where it was curved, leaning over the edges of his hospital bed. He could feel their eyes on him always as he turned his back to the crowd, swinging his legs over the side of the cot, and pushed himself up with the steadily building strength he found in his limbs. 

'Mr Potter!' Ms pomfrey half-yelled, 'What on god's green earth do you think you're doing?' She said, her hands finding purchase on his upper arms. The void grew. 

He didn't respond. Her hands were not gripping him very tightly, so simply by virtue of him walking away, was enough to remove him from her grip. 

She muttered something in protest, but despite that, she didn't follow him out of the hospital wing, or try to stop him as he started the long walk to the astronomy tower.

Chapter Text

It takes seven minutes to die.

Seven minutes, after your heart stops beating, and your lungs empty themselves of air. Seven minutes, before your brain gives into its primal urge. Complete and utter silence. 

Seven minutes, four hundred and twenty seconds, spent in that liminal plane, a dreaming world that so often escapes the living.

Indecision distilled into a thousand pixels forming in your brain. Living, dying, dreaming, awaking. 

No-one knows what happens then. What the soul sees as the last futile waves of electricity scatter over their failing neurones. 

Maybe one sees the face of the face of the lover they'd parted with when they were younger, or the late parent whose image had muddled with time. The photo albums of the mind, growing foggier each day in life, sharpen crystal clear in our dying moments. Life's final irony for the human race. 

If only the dead could achieve such clarity, then what hope was there for the living.

Or maybe it's like dreaming. An interpretation of millions of disjointed memories all placed into a personalised movie, playing out in the silver screen of the dying mind.

Or maybe they saw nothing at all.

It would be a poetic end, if unsatisfying. But it would only be unsatisfying for the living. The dead cannot care how they died. 

James wondered why people cared so much about what happens to us after those seven crucial minutes. Where the soul, if it exists flies off to, or what does it become. It's silly really, there's not a person alive who won't find out the answer to that question one day. But people are impatient, they cannot help themselves but ask questions that would be answered in their own time. 

That in of itself was comforting. That this was one thing, one question, one answer, that James never has to seek. That when James chooses it, or when the universe chooses for him, the time will come for him to learn, as all things do, and all things have done before him. 

He'd have seven minutes, to grieve, and to mourn, and then in all hopes it would be over. No more grief, no more mourning. His spirit, his human essence, whether it flies off to live among the clouds, or decomposes back to its base elements, would be freed of the flesh that has trapped him for fifteen years, kept him tethered to a place that has only really ever brought him pain.

He couldn't help but be comforted by it.  

He knew he shouldn't have been comforted by it. 

He knew that. 

But still, as he stood on the very upmost floor of the astronomy tower, basking in the sheer drop that it presented him with, its warmth wrapped around his rib cage, insulating him from the frigid air. 

James had no intention of dying... not really. But James did find some freedom in the concept nonetheless

He supposed that was concerning. That this feeling that sunk deep into his bones, resignation, acceptance, was concerning, but who would he tell? What would he say?

That he'd not given in to death, he'd just given up fighting for life. 

That when the wind blew him to either side of the mortal plane, behind the veil or in front of it, he would not fight either way. he would simply take what came. 

He felt it now. As he gazed down the fifty feet sheer drop, and weighed the merits of vanishing the fence, and allowing himself to fall. 

It would be a bloody awful way to go, James thought. He'd always been afraid of heights. But the thought of the earth coming to meet him in that brutal way, gave him less pause than the thought of having to go back to the Hospital wing, and face his friends, face his family, his teachers, his...Regulus. Come to them with the knowledge playing out in his mind, of what he'd allow the world to do to him. 

He supposed that was also concerning. 

He couldn't predict how his parent's would react. 

Sometimes they scowled at him in anger, after learning the things he had and had not been doing, other times just disappointment, and on the rare occasion a comforting smile. But those occasions were fleeting, his mind quickly painting over those pictures with caricatures of all the scenarios they hadn't yet played out together, just realistic enough to make his palms sweat. 

It was not that James particularly expected his Parents to be angry. This topic wasn't fresh ground for them, and while the reminder of his crumbling mental health was usually scarce around their dinner table, it wasn't non-existent. Especially not in the weeks and months following his more severe 'episodes' as his mother called them. 

But James, sick of the twisting pity and parental guilt on his parents' faces each time he informed them that it was getting worse rather than better, had all but stopped updating them on the situation. Letting those sorts of conversations gradually turn taboo. 

James was fine with that arrangement. His parents no longer worried about him, and he didn't have to suffer through endless mind healer appointments, or watch as his room was searched for anything particularly sharp or heavy. Everything was fine. 

Everything was totally fine. 

James was doing completely and utterly... fine.

****

The day passed quickly on the astronomy tower. 

James had little care though, for the gradual waning of the light filtering through the air, or the sharp cold pain piercing through his hands and feet, his mind was lost to thoughts he himself would soon struggle to clearly recall. 

Thoughts of Sirius, thoughts of Regulus, thoughts of his parents. 

All throughout it though... he felt numb. Like anaesthetics ran through his veins instead of blood. Every now and again James moved his fingers just to make sure he still could.

He felt paralysed.

Less by fear and more by indecision. As if one step either side would take him down a path that would only lead to more regret more pain.

So he stayed put. Even despite the uncomfortable tingling sensation he was starting to develop on his face, or the gnawing ache of his empty stomach.

He knew he’d have to go back at some point. The guilt over the thought of them all waiting there, his parents coming down with dumbledore and seeing him gone, was slowly building in his chest. Forming a lead weight between his ribs.

But James couldn’t fathom it just then. The walk, the guilt, the shame or the cold. None of it.

So he stayed put, at least somewhat sure that they wouldn’t mind waiting at least another half an hour.

****

It was forty five minutes after that point, before James finally made it back down to the hospital wing.

He had considered going straight back to the dorm, and avoiding the lot of them for as long as he could, but he was still in his hospital gown, and he vaguely remembered seeing his bag stashed next to the bed. 

He didn't like that it felt that hard. 

Choosing to face his friends, rather than to run away, to hide while he still had the option to. 

He hated that he'd got to that stage of estrangement, he'd been that distant, for that long, that facing them felt like a challenge, rather than a reunion. That going to the dorm sent shivers down his spine rather than relief. 

He hated that he missed them, even though they weren't gone. 

They were his family, and even though they weren't close as of late, the place where they used to sit in his life was still there. But it sat empty now, a void where the centre of his heart used to be. He felt so very hollow, without their constant presence in his consciousness, to the point where he was afraid that a strong gust of wind might blow him away.

Who was James Potter without the marauders?

And equally, a smaller, quieter part of his brain said: Who were the marauders without James Potter?

And while James didn't know the answer to either of those questions, he figured that it was at least somewhat important that he start to find out. 

His thoughts ran wild in the silence of the castle, empty for all but the ghosts, bound to walk endlessly through the corridors. But even they didn't bother him. He knew he looked slightly mad, marching determinedly, barefoot and freezing down empty hallways. But his walk was over before he really had time to feel self conscious. 

The hospital wing wasn't exactly cosy. Though he supposed hospitals in general never tended to be. 

Covered in white tile, head to toe, the white linens and cottons of the bedsheets, blending in smoothly with the background. forming an entirely white, smooth plane. 

He vaguely remembered being startled by that fact, in the delirium of sleep. Unable to distinguish between the floor and the walls, the ceiling and his bed frame. 

It was quiet in there, eerily silent like the rest of the castle, save for the soft tapping of his feet against the ground. 

'Jamie?' A voice called from behind a sheet hanging from the ceiling. He recognised it as Regulus'.

'Hi Reggie.' He said, hating how reluctant his voice sounded. He felt himself physically brace for the faces of his friends, sitting behind the curtain. 

But as the slender hand of the person who was quickly becoming his closest friend, pulled the white sheet back, he felt himself unfurl from the tight knot he'd wound himself into. Only the face of Regulus black looked back. 

His relief was tainted though, a black dot of disappointment in the clearing waters of his mind. He'd sort of built himself up so much to face them, to face Sirius, that he'd at that point, just rather have got it over and done with. 

'You alright?' Regulus said, his eyes tracking him carefully as he made to sit down on the bed. 

'Yeah.' He sighed, rubbing his eyes with his hands. 

He could see the corner of Regulus' mouth life up out the corner of his eye, 'Did you think Sirius was gonna be here?' He said, almost laughing.

James smiled, 'No.' he huffed. 

Regulus full on chuckled now, 'Ha! you were so fucking tense, I thought you'd seen a snake or something.' he moved to sit next to James on the bed, 'Nah, the others left a little while ago. I think they went to dinner?'

'No that's fine. I'll catch them back at the dorm.' James tuned his head to look at the boy next to him, 'Why were you waiting for me?' He said, his voice smaller than before. 

Regulus paused a moment before answering, 'Well I knew you went to the astronomy tower, and I figured you probably wanted a while alone to yourself. But, I wanted to be here when you got back, in case... you wanted to talk, or...' He seemed at a loss for things to say. 

'How did you know I went to the tower?' James said, his face slowly melting Into the easy smile he always found himself adopting around regulus. 

Regulus smiled softly, 'That's where you always go when things get shitty. I get it. It's where I go too.'

'Not always,' he said, 'you go there when things are good too.'

Regulus looked at James again, his mouth lifting into a smile that James couldn't understand the meaning of, 'Yeah. Yeah, I do.'

James allowed his mind to wander again, in the silence that followed. A frown marring his expression when he remembered that Sirius was likely waiting for him now, back at the dorm. Why did it have to be this hard?

Regulus frowned at James' expression, clearly searching for the right thing to say, 'Do you... Do you want to talk about it?' He said finally, his eyes lifting slowly to meet James'. 

Oh and how James had missed those eyes. Even in his darkest thoughts, that shade of grey had followed him, blanketing the surface of his mind. But James wasn't good at this, wasn't good at talking. But something inside James desperately wanted to. Wanted to open up his mind and spill his secrets, all at the first glimpse of that misty grey. 

Despite that, James opened his mouth to refuse, but Regulus quickly cut him off before he could.

'Look I'm worried. I know I shouldn't be, I know you can take care of yourself but...' He sighed, 'you just - I wish you could see yourself like I do sometimes. Because James, I know you, and I feel like the way you think about yourself, the way you think about how other people think about you - I just - You're not a burden James.' He said, allowing his statement to hang heavy in the air. 

'You do know that right?' Regulus lifted his hand to cup James' chin. Regulus' eyes were watery as they stared into James' own. And James hated that. Hated that he couldn't be better at this for him. better at talking, better at feeling, better at life. 

Regulus was quiet the next time he spoke again, 'I feel like you think that knowing you, knowing what's going on in your life, that that's a burden to the people around you. But it's not, Jamie. It's a fucking pleasure. Knowing you, is a fucking pleasure Jamie. I just -' Regulus' other hand came up to wipe the tears that were steadily rolling down his cheeks, 'you're so fucking good Jamie. Why can't you see it?'

Regulus had his arms wrapped fully around James now, the curve of his cheek resting smooth against his shoulder. James leant his head down, and rested his chin on Regulus' curls. James tried not to think about the fact that he smelt like honey. 

James rotated them, so that his back was pressed up against the headboard of the bed. Regulus shifted so that he was half laying to the side of James, his head rested in the corner of his neck. 

'Tell me?' Regulus said, his voice vibrating against James' collarbone. Clearly Regulus could feel James hesitating beneath him, 'Please?' He said, his voice turning pleading. His heart melted slightly. 

James took a breath, grounding himself in the constant weight of Regulus' body next to his, stroking the soft fabric of Regulus' jumper. 

'I- I've been stressed I guess.' He said, unsure of how to begin. For a moment he almost thought he would stop there, but the weight of Regulus' hand on his chest spurned him on again. 'I'm not great at this shit Reggie. The exams, the stress, any of it. I just, I guess I get a little wrapped up in my head. Forget that I need to do things sometimes, like eat, or sleep, or wake up or drink a glass of water, that kind of shit.'

'I never thought it'd get this bad I swear, I just... It's always been a problem. I don't like eating too much, I don't know why, it just... doesn't bring me joy exactly.' He said, smiling a half, sad little smile. 'But anyways, my mum always knew about it, even when I was a kid. And then... I don't really know what happened then. Maybe it was just the way of things, nature's order or some shit like that. Or maybe something happened that I just can't remember. But suddenly my brain got really loud, wouldn't turn off even when I was going to sleep.'

'It was like I had a radio constantly playing in my ear, only no-one else could hear it. Sometimes, when I'd be feeling a bit low, or I'd be stressed or whatever... the noise in my head, it just turned nasty. And it wasn't like I could turn it off, or tune it out, or stop listening, so I would just rot there, in my bed or on the sofa, just hearing it all, all the shit my brain cooked up and wanted me to hear. Mostly it was about myself, the things I was doing or did, the things I said, or the way I looked. It- it's still like that now.'

'I can shut it up sometimes, with alcohol or with studying or... or with pain. I just get so tired of it all.' He said finally, his eyes burning as hot tears threatened to spill over his cheeks, his nose sniffling as he tried to hold them back. 

'And the not eating... And the other stuff...' Regulus said, swallowing over his words, 'that hurts?'

'Yeah.' He breathed, not daring to look down. 'I don't want to do it Reggie, you get that right? I don't want to do any of it.'

'I know that, angel.' Regulus breathed, running a thumb over James' chest in what he hoped was a soothing gesture. 

'I just... I Just don't know what to do.' James said, exhaling a sigh, resting his head back on the headboard. The dull clunk of the wood against his skull half-echoing in the silence of the hospital wing. 'I just want it to stop.'

'I don't know how, but I- I'll find something to stop it James. I'll find someone to make it stop, I promise.' Regulus said after a moment, his heart clenching, as his mind raced to find answers to a seemingly impossible question. 

James smiled, and chuckled slightly, 'Is it mad that I believe you?' He said, running his fingers through the loose curls on the back of Regulus' head. His hair damp with sweat and tousled with a night of uneasy sleep. 

'I wouldn't lie to you Jamie. Never you.'

And once again, James believed him.